The Emerging World Civilization
Integral Mind / Infinite Sensitivity
“A living spirit grows and even outgrows its earlier forms of expression. This living spirit is eternally renewed and pursues its goal in manifold and inconceivable ways throughout the history of mankind. The names and forms which men have given it mean very little; they are the changing leaves and blossoms on the stem of the eternal”
Carl Jung
What Kind of Planetary Civilization?
It all began with a supernova explosion billions of years ago in the vast space of the Kosmos. A spinning planet full of abundant riches soared through space, carrying the seeds of sparkling blue sapphires and brilliant red rubies, delicate seeds of white orchids, the fragrance of pink roses, the courage of the panther and the warmth of a human smile. Science reveals a highly ordered Kosmos filled with energy and information, with interdependence and connectivity as its key features. Our traditions reveal a vast creative force of power, love and intelligence that guides the evolving universe and connects all things. We know now that we are inextricably connected with each other and with the life and health of the earth itself.
As our understanding evolves, we also expand our sense of scale from local communities, to nations, to the planet and to the Kosmos. Advances in consciousness research and spiritual practices widen our interior embrace of all life. Yet, the hopeful dreams of a united world appear to be more distant as we find ourselves in an intensifying global misalignment. We had hoped that when the Cold War ended we would live in a peaceful world. Instead we are discovering a world of clashing values; a world divided politically, socially and culturally into the elite and the impoverished; this at a time when the scale of global problems requires cooperation and alliances. We are face to face with the complexity of multiperspectives in diverse cultures in a newly globalized world.
How do we enfold egocentric and ethnocentric attitudes into a worldcentric consciousness that is aligned with nature and the Kosmos?
The modern Western worldview of scientific materialism and rationality, while offering countless benefits, also leaves us devoid of feeling, alienated from one another, existing in a meaningless and purposeless world. It leaves us longing to return to the basic moral intuition of the good, the true and the beautiful in a new holistic embrace.
Post-modern egalitarian and consensus worldviews often appease rather than address the growing threat of increasingly violent and clashing worldviews. The need to balance the limitations of prior worldviews, address the magnitude of changing life conditions and find our way through this transitional period in human history is leading us to the emergence of a post-post-modern worldview with a transformative vision. The time has come to see how partial solutions from the past fit into the evolving whole that is emerging. We are called to wholeness. We call that Integral.
The political front does not look promising. An increasing number of pre-modern failed states, as in sub Saharan Africa, are regressing to tribalism and criminality. Modern societies like the U.S., China, Russia and India still believe in settling conflict through military means. The post-modern societies of Western Europe are operating from the principle of interdependence, while immigrants with different values threaten their peace-loving societies. Mikhail Gorbachev has warned us that we must understand clearly the historical phase of development and mentality of each nation. No nation can impose a value system on another society which is at a different stage of development, and therefore has very different needs.
Members of The Integral Science Institute describe integral in this way: “Considering the ecological nature of all life means the necessity of stewardship—living in a way that sustains family, community, civilization and environment. Socially the integral age is working toward a networked-partnership culture linking a new global civilization. Economically it is bringing the Internet and the information age and with them a tremendous leap in collective planetary intelligence.”
Why an Integral Approach?
“In such unsheltered and uncertain times we yearn for the order and coherence which brings the merging forms of our own growth into rhythm with the concealed order of creation.”
John O’Donohue
Well-known integral philosophers, Ken Wilber, Ervin Laszlo and more recently Yasuhiko Kimura, while differing in approach, all agree that integral means wholeness. They agree that partial perspectives will no longer suffice. All have championed whole-systems thinking as a necessity for dealing with the complex challenges that are now of a global scale.
For Kosmos Journal an integral approach to the new civilization includes the necessity for some form of practice that develops inner awareness and mastery of the mind and emotions. It matters how each of us live our lives. We can all make a positive difference. We are embedded in our societies, and consequently cultural and worldviews drive our behavior. This forms the basis for potential clashes of worldview and points toward the necessity for political, economic and social structures that enhance rather than inhibit development and that allow our values to flourish.
While it is clear from research in diverse fields of study that it is a mistake to think that one can impose one’s own perspective on another culture or individual, it is nonetheless a mistake made often by individuals and countries. The imposition of values across cultures has created enormous problems in the current global crisis—not only through governmental action and development programs but also through religious perspectives that assume the universality of their particular worldview.
An integral perspective offers an alternative—meet people where they are and allow for natural and organic development. People are at different stages of development. For some the world revolves around “me,” for others it is “we,” for others it is “all of us.” And a few identify with Kosmos – “all life.” We need leaders with a global vision who can design enabling environments that foster a natural process of change.
The integral approach has demonstrated success. Some governments are taking a closer look. Bill Clinton referred to Ken Wilber’s work at the World Economic Forum in Davos. UNDP is now using Wilber’s work in a variety of programs. Integral thought has become the basis for new business models and leadership training. Don Beck has been applying Spiral Dynamics Integral to global issues. Ken Wilber will open the Integral University sometime this year, and Ervin Laszlo and partners are planning a free on-line World Wisdom University in the near future.
Kosmos advocates inner reflection and outward engagement, and the many perspectives that derive from an understanding of organic development and evolution. We believe that an understanding of how the world works and of the present political and global realities are essential to global transformation. We encourage finding the essential self or place of wisdom within as a source of guidance for living our lives. The most important question of the times may be: How do we prepare ourselves to align with Kosmos and to build the forms that will express the next stage of global emergence?
Each major transition in cultural evolution, from agrarian, to industrial to information ages, or, from egocentric, to sociocentric to worldcentric perspectives, awakens and sensitizes us to wider care and concern. You and I will be the co-creators of the emerging planetary civilization. We will find the way as we tap into latent skills and capacities we didn’t even know we had. We will meet the call of the times because we care.
Focusing beyond the chaos of the snowballing global crisis, we find that humanity has made a great deal of progress. For example, in most places slavery is no longer accepted; environmental concerns and citizen activism are increasing; women and children’s rights have taken great leaps forward; anti-war protests are international in scope for the first time, designed to prevent war rather than to stop one already in progress; and intermarriage between different cultures is common. Children are being born today with global consciousness. Many have spent long hours practicing disciplines to overcome learned destructive habits of mind and to manage emotions and conflict. A moral trajectory is clearly being forged. It is in alignment with an innate urge of humanity to create a new civilization based on Inner Unity with Outer Diversity.
Nations now struggle with a tension between the autonomy of their own sovereignty and the common good of the planet, just as individuals struggle between the selfish values of the personality and the selflessness of the Essential Self. Everyone is challenged now, preparing for the birth of a new global civilization. Historically all advances in consciousness are preceded by a struggle of Herculean proportions, a Dark Night of despair, hopelessness and confusion. In our own lives and in the lives of cultures and nations old values die, often quite painfully, before the living flame of a new perspective is revealed. We need to develop a breadth of vision, strong inner resources and effective skills in action to find security in an uncertain world.
“The threat to human survival is of cultural origin. The obsolescence of the culture we have inherited from the mainstream 20th century is its cause and the revitalization of the culture of the 21st century is its solution.”
Ervin Laszlo
A multilevel and multidimensional approach is needed to deal with the complexities of globalization. This means that what is right for me is not necessarily right for you. Simplistic, top-down solutions are replaced with networking and dialogue. We are gaining a deep understanding of the uniqueness of people’s life circumstances, and as a consequence of those circumstances, a whole array of diverse needs of individuals and cultures that lie at the core of life itself. Idealistic pleas for One Humanity will not effectively address the great challenge with which we are faced. How will we harmonize the diverse needs of humanity into one integral whole without imposing a dogmatic worldview?
We cannot accept in silence a world where the 500 richest people have more of the world’s assets than the poorest 1 billion, where 1.2 billion live on $1 a day, where the 5 permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, whose mandate is international peace and security, sell 80% of global arms exports. Let us begin with a new vision for a second enlightenment—a renaissance of values where we hear the laughter of children at play instead of their fearful cries of terror—where we greet each stranger with the warmth of a human smile instead of with suspicion—where families protect each other and their homes instead of being thrown apart in senseless wars—where pollution is eliminated and where every flower retains its sweet perfume. Let us be in touch with our humanity. Let us feel the world’s pain and transform it into songs of joy.
Must we endure another catastrophe before we learn to come together?
Infinite Sensitivity
"In much of the world there exist societies whose richness lies in their soul and not their soil…whose imagination is more valuable than their technology… It is unthinkable that they would develop without literature, without song and dance and music and stories."
Sashi Tharoor, United Nations
"We cannot encounter the heart of a culture unless we attend to this inner creative impulse whose vision and intention is ultimately the Beautiful."
John O’Donohue
Integral minds and natural planetary designs move us forward on our evolutionary trajectory towards a global civilization. Beauty and love open the heart to global community. A world at one with itself will not be realized simply by signing treaties, passing laws or by developing ethical creeds. It is by forging bonds of trust and sensitivity to the needs of people at the deepest level of existence that world community will arise.
Developed sensitivity through beauty is a critical but under-valued element in opening the heart of the new global civilization for which we all yearn. The heart brings coherence and alignment with the natural rhythm of the universe. Like a gentle breeze it brings its universal message across space and time into the divisions of our sometimes troubled minds. In our enchantment with the rational mind we have tended to forget that it is the heart that breaks down the barriers that separate.
Preserving cultural integrity is particularly necessary for postcolonial societies. Like individuals, these societies must develop an identity rooted in local community before they can engage as global citizens. Jean Houston has traveled the globe helping postcolonial societies identify and take pride in their special offering to the planetary whole—often through art.
Art can serve as an entertaining diversion or as a powerful transformer. It has the power to separate and polarize—or to bring together. It can lead us into indulgence, greed and selfishness, or it can uplift and elevate us to our wisest and most compassionate selves. We are barraged with all kinds of ugliness in the name of “art.” We need only to turn on our television sets to bring violence, anger and polarization into the intimacy of our homes.
“At its deepest heart, creativity is meant to serve and evoke beauty. When this desire and capacity comes alive, new wells awaken in parched ground; difficulty becomes invitation and rather than striving against the grain of our nature, we fall into rhythm with its deepest urgency and passion." John O’Donohue
Transformational art follows the guidelines of the harmonious spinning of the Kosmos itself, from atoms to planets, straight to the stars. It aligns with a universal place within, where the whole human condition can be captured and expressed in a creative work. Aesthetics does not follow societal rules. It has its own turning—its own special path to truth, goodness and beauty.
True art is a moving force. We are elevated in its presence. We leave behind negative habits of thought and deed—the agony and ugliness of unlived lives. Its majesty moves us towards the magnetic power of Oneness and liberation with a natural simplicity. We remember our common origin in those exhilarating moments of contact. We feel nourished; at last we know we are home. When we are filled with aesthetic delight and the thrill and the grace of the beautiful, we open ourselves to go with life rather than against it. Our fears vanish and we stand in the Field of Springtime, free, fresh, alive and open to tread more lightly on the sacred earth.
“Our joy in the Beautiful is as native to us as our breath, a lyrical act where we surrender but to awaken.”
John O’Donohue
The highest destiny of the arts is to carry us into an exquisite state of being where every action becomes a gesture of love; where every encounter becomes an exchange of dignity and grace; where a Kosmic vision pulls us to the greater good; where beauty of being overflows into beauty of nations, into beauty of planets, into the beauty of the Kosmos. And it is in this state that we fall in love with Life and find the One Humanity.
Our souls are hungry for beauty. Dostoyevsky once said, “Perhaps it is beauty that will save us in the end;” and from Rumi, “Let the beauty we love be what we do—there are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground.” Beauty dwells in a soft whisper that blows our hearts wide open with love.
A Kosmic vision is emerging at the margins of society today—beyond the dichotomies of masculine and feminine, yin and yang, hard and soft. This profound vision rests in the heart of true creativity, a vision that embraces oneness of all life and all creation. Another world emerges from this space, subtly invading our day-life without our even noticing. It is from this timeless, spaceless place that changes of mind occur and new planetary designs drop into our field of consciousness. Now we know because a sense of rightness resonates within.
The blueprint for a new civilization resides in the depths of our being—waiting patiently for us to notice its gentle beckoning. Awaken! Awaken now!